The Rate of Obsolescence of Technical Knowledge--A Comment

Schott, Kerry

doi:10.2307/2097872

Cited by 6 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 2 publications

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“…On the other hand, however, this effect is countered by the inventor's education knowledge becoming, at least to some extent, obsolete with the passage of time (Bosworth 1978;Schott 1978;Pakes and Schankerman 1984;Park, Shin and Park 2006). The knowledge acquired by an inventor during his education -the map that facilitates his technological search (Fleming and Sorenson 2004) -may have less and less relevance for his technological recombination activities, making it increasingly challenging and cumbersome to recombine technological knowledge across domains.…”

Section: Hypothesis 2: the Breadth Of An Inventor's Technological Recmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…He emphasizes that these differences not only lie in the kinds of people who are drawn to the two domains, but also in the different kinds of education and socialization they receive. We extend Allen's propositions by considering the level of education that the inventor has attained, and by taking into account the time dimension -as knowledge becomes obsolete and as effects of educational socialization get weaker over time (Bosworth 1978;Schott 1978;Pakes and Schankerman 1984), the differences between a scientific or engineering-based education may well diminish.…”

Section: -Introductionmentioning

confidence: 98%

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Knowledge Recombination Across Technological Boundaries: Scientists vs. Engineers

Gruber

Harhoff

Hoisl³

2013

Management Science

247

154

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Building on the seminal work of Allen (1977), we contribute to the emerging micro-level theory of knowledge recombination by examining how individual-level characteristics of inventors affect the breadth of their technological recombinations. Our data set combines information from 30,550 European patents with matched survey data obtained from 1,880 inventors. The analysis supports the view that inventors with a scientific education are more likely to generate patents that span technological boundaries (in our case, 30 broad, top-level technological domains) than inventors with an engineering degree. A doctoral degree is associated with increased recombination breadth for all groups of inventors. The breadth of an inventor's technological recombinations diminishes with increasing temporal distance to his education, but the differences between scientists and engineers persist over time. Our findings provide several new insights for research on inventors, the literature on organizational learning and innovation, and for strategy research.

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Section: Hypothesis 2: the Breadth Of An Inventor's Technological Recmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: -Introductionmentioning

confidence: 98%

Knowledge Recombination Across Technological Boundaries: Scientists vs. Engineers

Gruber

Harhoff

Hoisl³

2013

Management Science

247

154

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…Based on the foregoing review and the historical review with international comparisons (Schott, 1978;Bosworth, 1978; Japan Science and Technology Agency, 1985; Mitsubishi Research Institute, 1991; Watanabe, 1992; Watanabe, 1999; OECD, annual issues), the rate of obsolescence of technology in UPM over the 1990-2017 period was estimated, as illustrated in Fig. 17 (see the details of the estimation approach and estimated values in Appendices 3 and 4).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Digitalized bioeconomy: Planned obsolescence-driven circular economy enabled by Co-Evolutionary coupling

Watanabe

Naveed

Neittaanmäki

2019

Technology in Society

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Driven by digital solutions, the bioeconomy is taking major steps forward in recent years toward achievement of the long-lasting goal of transition from a traditional fossil economy to a bioeconomy-based circular economy.The coupling of digitalization and bioeconomy is leading towards a digitalized bioeconomy that can satisfy the shift in consumers' preferences for eco-consciousness, which in turn induces coupling of up-down stream operation in the value chain.Thus, the co-evolution of the coupling of digitalization and bioeconomy and of upstream and downstream operations is transforming the forest-based bioeconomy into a digital platform industry.Aiming at addressing this transformation, a model was developed that explains above mentioned dynamism and demonstrated its reliability through an empirical analysis focusing on the development trajectory of UPM (forest-based ecosystem leader in Europe and a world pioneer in the circular economy) over the last quarter century, highlighting its efforts towards planned obsolescence-driven circular economy.It was comprehended that with the advancement of digital innovations, UPM has incorporated a self-propagating function that accelerates digital solution. Furthermore, this self-propagating function was triggered by coupling with a downstream leader, Amazon, in the United States.The dynamism in transforming a forest-based bioeconomy into a digital platform industry is thus clarified, and new insights common to all industries in the digital economy are provided.

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“…We then approximate the total value produced by a team during its life-cycle by the car's qualifying score averaged over the team life-cycle. This approximation is a reasonable one given that innovations tend to have a high rate of obsolescence (Bosworth, 1978;Schott, 1978;Pakes and Schankerman, 1984). It is even more reasonable in the case of Formula 1 innovations, because they are subject to an important threat of imitation and Formula 1 constructors have to cope with frequent changes in the regulatory environment.…”

Section: Econometric Methodologymentioning

confidence: 99%

The Speedy Road to Success: Knowledge Overlap in R&D Teams

Conti

Hoisl²

2012

Proceedings

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The importance of teamwork in the production of R&D-intensive output has been widely acknowledged and understanding its mechanisms has become crucial. This study focuses on a particular aspect of the organization of R&D-intensive teams, the level of knowledge overlap of its members. We analyze the relevant trade-off a firm needs to solve when choosing the optimal level of knowledge overlap for its R&D team. In fact, on the one hand, a large knowledge overlap is often associated with low coordination costs. On the other hand, to the extent that production in R&D-intensive sectors consists of problem solving, a large overlap is then associated with a low probability that the solution to these problems lies within the team knowledge set. We show that, under certain conditions, there exists a level of knowledge overlap which maximizes the present discounted value generated from the innovations produced by the team, over its life horizon. We test this prediction using a novel dataset on R&D top management teams in Formula 1. Having controlled for a large number of factors, we find an inverted u-shaped relation between the value produced by the team and its degree of knowledge overlap.

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The Rate of Obsolescence of Technical Knowledge--A Comment

Cited by 6 publications

References 2 publications

Knowledge Recombination Across Technological Boundaries: Scientists vs. Engineers

Knowledge Recombination Across Technological Boundaries: Scientists vs. Engineers

Digitalized bioeconomy: Planned obsolescence-driven circular economy enabled by Co-Evolutionary coupling

The Speedy Road to Success: Knowledge Overlap in R&D Teams

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